I hope summer isn’t completely over @internrachel and @julia1 because I have some books to report on. Like a bunch, I went on a YA kick the past week and the library has been really good about processing my holds fast. Here is the list: Wintergirls by Laurie Halse Anderson (288 pgs.), Thirteen Reasons Why by Jay Asher (336 pgs.), Before I Fall by Lauren Oliver (480 pgs.), Project 17 by Laurie Stolarz (272 pgs.), Suicide Notes by Michael Thomas Ford (304 pgs.) and It’s Kind of a Funny Story by Ned Vizzini (448 pgs.). I also gave up on The Second Sex by Simone de Beauvoir about 440 pgs in and I read Swinging Sixties by Christopher Breward, David Gilbert and Jenny Lister (128 pgs.) and Radical Rags: Fashions of the Sixties by Joel Lobenthal (256 pgs.) for school. Hopefully school books count! And here go the reviews!
So obviously (maybe?) I tend to the ‘depressed kid’ variety of YA. I don’t know, it’s what I like. Wintergirls and Thirteen Reasons Why are rereads that I own, Wintergirls is about an anorexic girl as she spirals out of control after the death of her former best friend and Thirteen Reasons Why follows a boy who receives a series of cassette tapes from a girl who recently committed suicide trying to explain the reasons that led to her decision. I think Wintergirls is more successful (even though I like both books), Anderson captures the voice of a teen girl in peril really well with real opinions crossed out and followed with more appropriate ones, the way a depressed brain can fixate on particular ideas but still be overcrowded with other ideas and a person that can’t figure out how to talk to anyone around her. If you’re interested in reading I’d warn that it can be triggering for eating disorders and self-harm. It, of course, doesn’t show eating disorders in a positive light (a character dies a pretty horrible e.d. related death) and it also shows the isolation disorders like this can bring. Thirteen Reasons Why succeeds because of interesting style, I think the main character is overly dramatic and a little unrealistic. The story tries to show how rumors, unfounded or otherwise, can compound into awful consequences. Does this happen? I don’t know, I’ve never really had any terrible rumors spread about me, other than I’m slightly crazy which is true (one kid in high school thought I was the leader of a girl gang, I was so flattered!). Still it’s a fun book (uhh ‘fun’ book) to read and I find myself going back to it a couple times a year. I read Before I Fall because somebody else on this group reviewed it and it sounded interesting. A girl relieves the day she dies for seven days trying to figure out why she keeps coming back. It was a pretty good book, an interesting premise and it was fun to see how she tries to change each day (and conveniently goes through the stages of grief (which I almost called the cycles of death, hipster bike league name anyone?)). It’s nice that the people she encounters become more real and less caricatures as the story progresses and the finish is satisfying but also kind of not. Project 17 was by far the worst book in this batch. It wasn’t terrible but like all of the characters were pretty dumb and annoying. What redeemed it was that it was set in Danvers State Hospital which I am obsessed with and I’m totally sad that it no longer stands. Basically I’d only recommend this if you want to imagine that you’re wandering through Danvers. Dumb-ish ghost story, dumb characters, ok commentary on how patients were treated there, AWESOME setting. Suicides Notes was pretty sweet (not in the sweet! way though). A boy attempts suicide on New Year’s and winds up in a psychiatric ward for 45 days. He learns important things about himself, the way you do, but he has an interesting personality that is undiminished by his suicide attempt. Good-ish portrayal of coming out to yourself. It’s Kind of a Funny Story was particularly good, I read it because I liked the movie and wanted to see how the book measured up. They’re both great, different but great. Super awesome accurate portrayal of depression thinking and life in an idyllic psych ward. I was honestly jealous of the psych ward in the story, my very brief experience with one was less positive. All of the characters are fun and interesting, the ending is maybe a little too perfect but I guess that’s okay in a book where someone nearly kills themself.
I had to stop reading The Second Sex because I alternated from soooooo bored to vaguely annoyed. I don’t like Freudian psychology and I’m surprised that a woman would latch on so tightly to it as I’ve always found it fairly mysogynistic. Maybe it was the times? Anyways the chapter on lesbians is hilarious, it’s the only part I would recommend and only for a good laugh. I probably misinterpreted a lot of what I read but honestly I don’t care, it wasn’t for me. Swinging Sixties and Radical Rags were both great, very informative about the rapidly changing styles of the 60s and all the many many influences. Very good for someone who needs to be researching 60s fashion (both with a lower and upper-case ‘f’) as I currently am. Did that sentence make sense? I hope so, anyways both books are great and if you want to have a better understanding of popular clothing and culture of the time read those books at least as a start.
I’m out (for now)